Let’s See – Chapter 7, Act 3, Strip 22

Having successfully snuck past the besiegers, K’ip proceeds to the second stage of their plan: locating the secret entrance.

And, yes, it’s only a question of locating it – there was really no doubt that a secret entrance would exist. Fantasy castles always have secret entrances, period. Their designs might break the rules of reason, logic, or even physics, but there are some fundamental rules they’ll never break – and having a secret entrance is one of them. As experienced (by now) inhabitants of a fantasy world, K’ip and Si’ri are naturally aware of this rule, and built their plan around it.

Knowing that a secret entrance is there, the next, and more difficult, step is to see it – naturally, such hidden entrances are, well, hidden, or even well-hidden, and thus difficult to see. Fortunately, though, they’re quite easy to see, since they tend to break the pattern of the background quite obviously – often, they’ll have a completely different texture, in fact. But, because they’re difficult to see, you might not see them immediately after seeing them, if you fail your spot check. Fortunately, K’ip and Si’ri aren’t under that much of time pressure right now (dawn will not come, after all, until one of them mentions it), and can afford to just repeat K’ip’s spot check until they finally see the secret door they’ve been looking at the whole time.

For people who are not experienced inhabitants of a fantasy world, of course, this whole procedure might indeed be a bit strange or at least counter-intuitive. For that reason, it’s a good thing that Si’ri immediately lampshades it – for which she’s very well positioned right at the moment, anyway.